Hitherto little attention has been paid to methods of maintaining the body temperature of newborn infants, particularly in the immediate post-delivery period. The problem is especially severe for premature babies and other babies having low birth weight. A newborn infant traditionally has been swaddled in a simple blanket and transported from the delivery room to the hospital nursery, with little emphasis placed on retention of natural body heat.
Furthermore, in recent years doctors have determined that bonding of newborn babies to their parents is very important in their development, and that it is particularly important that bonding commence as soon after birth as possible. Parent-infant bonding dictates close parent-infant contact immediately following birth, and this delays the transportation of the baby to the nursery. Since many hospital nurseries are located a considerable distance from the delivery facilities, in some cases even on other floors of the hospital, substantial heat loss from the infant is predictable, with, in some cases, harmful results.